Beyond Honor and Duty
by sakurablossomhime
Summary: What if a very unlikely bond for life happened between two very different people? Very likely a crack pairing but it was written for my dear Obsidians. I hope other shall enjoy as much I did just writing it.


Sephiroth's will never did know when to throw in the towel. His genetic makeup was just too strong for the Lifestream and so was his stubbornness. The one thing insanity brought on by Jenova was not strong enough to surpass, was one pink clad woman by the name of Aerith. She was done with the rebirth of hate. She'd cured him and spit his carcass out in her pool of water covered in lilies in her church.

He knew there would be a battle on his waking up, even if he'd had his wits about him again. Everything had changed. People were in relationships, children had been born, but Sephiroth on being found by no other than Cloud Strife, was surprised at how the man handled it. He'd smirked at him, making him more uncomfortable their fighting constantly. As if he had known it would be so much worse.

AVALANCHE had completely offered up Sephiroth to serve under the new dynasty of Wutai's rule. He could not have known. The man looked less than impressed while Yuffie shot him a victorious smile because they knew the real truth, he was to serve Wutai as more than just a bodyguard to Lady Yuffie, as had been publicly announced.

 _Flashback_

Sephiroth looked questionably from Reeve to Rufus, positive he must be hearing things.

"You wish me to do what?" he asked them, with a look of sheer offense on his face.

"You are to be given to the nation of Wutai. Lady Yuffie's been gracious in welcoming you to atone for your crimes against her people" Reeve said.

The rest of the Wutaian council stood by silently that represented Yuffie's father's dynasty, and now hers. Chekov spoke albeit a bit fast.

"You are also to serve as her Head Royal Guard… _astheladiespersonalconcubine_ " Chekov stated, finishing in a murmur, after all but choking on his tongue almost to rid his mouth of the words. Shake to his side, blushed as she had come as one of the ambassadors as well. Staniv stood by like a stone, also trying to control the heat creeping into his face.

" Concubine?" Sephiroth stated completely bypassing the "Head Royal Guard" title, his ire rising. "But a concubine is a person with a lower status in a household than a wife, is sexually submissive, and a female. I am clearly not any of those aspects. I refuse on the sheer principle of _whom_ you are attempting to "mate" me with" he bit out.

"A concubine in Wutai can be a male too if the person is assigned the opposite sex from royalty, like Lady Yuffie" Rufus supplied. Wide, acidic eyes pinned him as Sephiroth had forgotten for a second he was even there after this outrage.

"You cannot be sincere. She is a prepubescent child and I am a perpetually singular as I need no…" relationships" and fine with my time _alone_ " he stated haughtily, but quickly took in the looks given to him of "you're seriously saying that" to just plain sympathy for a man-child that didn't know any better himself.

Sephiroth was livid.

" Yes you would be acting as a combination of her bodyguard and lover. You have all the correct criteria for the position, you're strong and have previous military training to act as her bodyguard. As far as being her concubine, you are a sexually desirable male, are intelligent and a decent conversationalist, charming well, you can work on that and the rest can be taught" Rufus said dismissively, causing Shake to laugh behind her hand, and have Sephiroth glaring at her, leaving Sephiroth with no doubt in his mind what he was expected to learn.

"Taught how?" his agitating seeping through his voice, his face showing a barely there blush now.

"There are schools for concubines. You can learn how to pleasure a female" Reeve said, clearly enjoying the stoic man's discomfort, his veiled insult that he knew the ex-general did not already have that knowledge and was not lost on the silver haired male.

"I clearly stated that I had refused. What could you hope to do to me?" he asked them, arms crossed and head held in a snooty fashion.

"I can answer that. You'll be executed due to your past little "break with reality" during your 'Godhood'. I am sure you remember, don't you Sephiroth?" Rufus said.

Sephiroth was seething inside. He knew he was still the strongest, agile creation known to man and this man _dare_ threaten his life? Oh there was that one small thing of Aerith taking away his more violent tendencies. He could still behead them all with Masamune. He'd been cured and promised Aerith he would try to be cordial once brought back though. It wouldn't do to be immediately executed or to have more blood on his hands that he never wanted in the first place, even from when he was young.

"Or you can accept our agreement. No one needs know about the full arrangements beside Yuffie and ourselves, we can tell everyone you're just her bodyguard."

"I still do not understand? Do you truly mean to have me procreate? I am virile and contrary to popular belief due to my making, I am not sterile" he demanded, his mind already leaping ahead to the possible outcomes of what was being suggested; he couldn't fathom was being suggested of _him_.

"Trust me Sephiroth, no one wants to have your children. Lady Yuffie is already handling that aspect of course in anticipation of this. As to why, let's just that you both could use some "relaxation". It's not a lifelong contract. You will be released when she marries. What do you say?" Reeve asked him, knowing he had him over a barrel. Gloating that this would get him out of harm's way from citizens who might wish to take retaliation against him for his past crimes by banishing him to Wutai. Plus, the way he would have to serve was a gorgeous insult to the sexless man. It seemed like a win-win situation as far as Reeve was concerned.

 _End Flashback_

 _Concubine School_

Sephiroth sat with the other pretty boys and men that would be concubines as he set out his pen, another pen as back up, and a fresh spiral notepad. He sat there like he was in the war room and orders were being given to strike the enemy. He felt himself bristle when his sensitive hearing picked up someone muttering in Wutaian to another man that he understood, having an ear for languages.

"Check out the ex-General there. With his renowned popularity back in the day, who knew he'd needed to be taught? Is he really planning to taking notes?" the one young man said to the other, perplexed by Sephiroth's antics. The other man was just shocked as the other that he was there, but listened intently.

Sephiroth coughed into his gloved hand and lightly tapped his ear, indicating he had heard and _understood them_ clearly. Both boys quailed.

Sephiroth didn't even look over his shoulder while he put his pen and notepad away. He had assumed this learning classroom was the same as any others where note taking was encouraged. Apparently he had been wrong.

What the hell was he doing here? He felt so out of his element.

The initial interview had been bad enough where he was taken into an office and given written tests about politics, current events, and history. Those he passed with flying colors. When asked about this, he was informed that a concubine had to be well educated so as not to embarrass his Lord or Lady and must be able to carry on an intelligent conversation with them on a variety of subjects to keep them entertained. Sephiroth had been surprised to learn that a concubine's brain came into play at all.

Next he had been given a series of endurance tests that he passed shameless easily as well. When inquiring why they were necessary, the person had just rolled his eyes at him and refused to answer his question.

The last one had been the worst where he was taken into a doctor's office that smelled of a series nightmare inducing scents from his childhood. He had been asked to strip and as clinically as possible, had his measurements taken. He blushed when the blue pill he had been asked to take at the beginning of the interview kicked in and the doctor had the audacity to attempt to _measure_ the most private part of himself. He had quickly snatched the tape measure from him and blushingly did it himself while the doctor looked on, seemingly impressed at the length at how his eyebrows shot up at what Sephiroth read out.

Insulting blood tests were taken for STD's and HIV and more blood work to assess his health. Then x-rays, MRI and all the other things that were required to become nothing more than a personal whore, in Sephiroth's eyes and he was about to become one. It all was cumbersome as if they had forgotten about his alien DNA that negated all diseases.

With Sephiroth's unorthodox upbringing, he really didn't much care to have people touch him and steered clear of all types of intimate touches. He had always been taught to try to advance himself physically and intellectually. So little, thought was given to his biological needs, except to overcome them and control his emotions through strict discipline and he had surpassed them. What other men bragged about, he saw as a weakness as he witnessed his other SOLDIERS weeping over the loss of a boyfriend or girlfriend or the nauseating giddiness over gaining one. It made no sense and the way that intercourse was achieved, with the sharing of bodily fluids. Revolting. Yes, he knew the process of going about it and how babies were conceived, but certainly didn't wish to engage in any of it.

His three friends all had been sexually active. Genesis was pansexual, Zach was Bi, and Angeal straight male, yet after consumption of alcohol became a "curious, fair weather homosexual", and they would brag about their conquests and seemed to expect Sephiroth to do the same. Eventually, they stopped asking, but he overhead them speculating if he had a discreet arrangement with a grunt or two. Finally, they realized what he really was asexual and left him alone and he went about his business.

Sephiroth turned his attention to what he assumed was the class teacher at how elaborately she was made up and dressed.

"Hello, I'm Miss Hayashi and this is the assistant, Lydia. She will help me figure out your strengths and weakness in the most unphysical way possible because of course, your manhood's are now pledged to your Lords or Ladies and on one else is allowed to touch you sexually, at least until your contract is through," she said and Sephiroth had no idea he blanched at this.

"She shall just assess your kissing skills as of present and serve as a model for female genitalia" she explained. Sephiroth flushed at this and wished himself far, far away. He visibly blushed deeply as the pretty, longhaired Wutaian female made her way around the room and kissed each one and give them pointers.

She stopped in front of him and politely bowed.

"Hello Sephiroth, I have been told that the circumstances of your conscription are an unusual case. I understand that this must all seem very odd to you, but as you are half Wutaian, therefore, you do qualify as a concubine" Lydia said as if to put him at ease.

"You don't have anything to worry about, the Lord and Ladies are forbidden to mistreat a concubine and Lady Yuffie is a kind woman. You will be given a lot of freedom and should any children occur, they would be given the choice of becoming a concubine or else given in marriage to minor royalty because of who their mother is" she explained.

"It's not such a bad life, I was raised in the royal palace alongside my other brothers and sisters and treated no differently. I chose to become a concubine on short term contracts until I choose to marry. Concubines actually have more independence than royalty."

"Wait, I'm half Wutaian?" he said, raising his eyebrows in confusion and he studied the girl, wondering why anyone in their right mind would choose a life of sexual servility. She certainly didn't look deranged, he knew what that looked like based on experience, very well in fact.

"According to your DNA test, yes" she said, "now are you ready to kiss me?" She asked him.

Sephiroth frowned, not certain how to go about it as he tried to figure out where lips should be placed and noses so they wouldn't get in the way, until Lydia just reached up and captured his face in her hands. He resisted the urge to punch her and bolt away as she pulled his lips to hers and he tried to follow the motions of her lips on his. He felt really awkward at first and then started getting into it and felt an unfamiliar rush of heat suffuse his body. He allowed her to open his lips and then startled back when something disgustingly slippery and wet delved into his mouth.

"What the hell do you think you're doing? It's bad enough that I have to share your saliva, but why the Goddess would you dare to put your tongue in my mouth? That's disgusting" he growled aghast and narrowed his eyes when everyone started laughing. They quickly stopped at his wild eyed, I-will-murder-you look.

Mrs. Hayashi came over to him and put her hand on his arm in sympathy.

"It's okay, everyone learns at their own pace. That is called French kissing," she explained to the particular looking ex-general.

The rest of the lessons had Sephiroth's face flaming as Lydia was stripped to show how to stimulate a woman and a male volunteer came in for a demonstration. Sephiroth learned the hard way what was involved in sexually stimulating a female and a male to prepare them for intercourse, positioning and ways to induce orgasm on both and hoped it was all a bad dream what he would wake up from soon. Surely he wasn't expected to put his mouth on someone else's organ?

Once he had been through the basics so to speak, fetishes were introduced. The more they talked casually about whips, bondage, prostate massages and the like. An ominous creaking came from Sephiroth's table. The teacher held up, the whole class focusing on him and the _obvious finger patterns_ on the table where he'd clinched it until his knuckles were white.

Seeing that he had calmed down once more, the teacher continued with the arts of amour.

When it was all done, Sephiroth had literally stumbled out the pagoda looking a right mess, despite his audience to his distress. This was too cruel, even for Rufus. Before he decided to manifest his wing and fly away taking his chances, he was thrust into new training: one of the royal guard.

 _***Bratty Princess Guarding***_

Royal Guard training proved to be definitely less stressful and convoluted. Most principles followed the previous knowledge that Sephiroth already had being a General for such a long time previously. He did have his pen and paper back out, finding that customs of a concubine/guard were as the young concubine Lydia had said. The relationship between Yuffie Kisaragi, Empress of Wutai and himself was likened to a marriage. So much so, that if the Lady wished it, she _could_ marry him and him become the actual Emperor. Sephiroth's head swam with thought. What if she'd. . .kept him afterwards, for indefinite? The land he once had scourged for Shinra's name…could be his own to protect. Sephiroth took a deep breath and experienced the strongest shiver down his back. Yuffie Kisaragi…the brat Empress, his wife? He'd never felt nausea before this intense since back when he'd gotten Mako injections. His ire was raised though the rest of training breezed by as when it came time to test his hand to hand or swordplay, no one dared come against the deranged silver haired male who years was dubbed "Demon of Wutai" for a reason.

It was the best they did not come at him. He would have mowed them down frustration. Magic was also an option. Just as he was about to "test" his skills, he was passed along with official seals of approval from the older Leading Guardsmen to preserve everyone's lives.

From there it was to the tailor.

This is where Sephiroth was seeing red…flames. He was expected to shed his SOLDIER custom made uniform that was a second skin for him in all his revivals for some silken shame. Sephiroth sneered at the seamstress who was wizened and just as cantankerous as him in her old age. In other words, the Sephiroth patented scowl was rendered useless against her.

She knew who he was, what he had done to their country, and his now fitting punishment. Both Empress and he were both spoiled children. She knew looks were deceiving with him, as he was younger than he appeared emotionally. Sure he was thirty years old, but he'd been used the most of all by the same company that condemned him to this task.

Sephiroth was still standing there with arms crossed across his chest looking at the decrepit woman. He made to turn and walk away from her. With an agility and speed undercutting her age, she'd stripped him of his clothes, learning that he wore no under clothing. Just as well as that aspect wouldn't be changing.

Sephiroth whipped around so fast, his own hair struck out at the woman in its length, only to be blocked by her cane. To see his pants around his knees while everything else was just pulled from him, he stood in a mute rage. It would not do to strike this Magpie in human disguise down. He stared at her with his severely slit pupils and acidic green eyes glaring her out of existence as he removed the rest of his clothing away from him, boots and pants.

The old creature had the audacity to shear his harness off of him. So now Sephiroth stood exactly as he had, only now those arms crossed bare muscled chest and he held a firm staring match _completely nude_ with the hag as he loomed over her bent form.

The woman began to speak in her heavily accented but clear voice.

"You think that you can intimidate me with a pair of serpentine eyes, child?" the woman, Miyuki, stated as if talking about the weather. Even as he stood there, she began clothing him again in the Royal Guard attire. She initially was to leave him bare below, but after glancing at the hakama pants and back to his nature, decided on a fundoshi in the end. It wouldn't do for him not to be bound in such attire, especially if he decided to fit his role and the Empress should accost him and leave him in a "way".

She quickly wrapped the material between his firm thighs and around his muscular behind. There was another ominous creaking coming from the vicinity of Sephiroth's hands. He had not taken off his gloves and would not do so but the leather protested against the clenched fist he made. She carried on putting on his kosode, following up with corralling him into his hakama of gray and finally covering it all with a haori of black. His silvery hair laid against the back of the haori looking ethereal. The final touch was the zori placed on his feet. Miyuki appraised her work and saw that despite him being an insufferable ass, he was a beautiful boy. She gathered his previous clothing that she had maimed and began to take it away.

Sephiroth moved to protect his armor. It may not have meant anything to anyone else, but the clothing was an extension of him. Before he could do anything rash like breaking her neck, she stopped him with her words.

"I am aware this garb means a lot to you so I will be repairing them and what I cannot, I will take to Aoi since he deals with leather" she said shortly. Despite his menacing look, Sephiroth did relax. Miyuki simply laughed and turned away with his clothes, making him scowl again at her retreating back.

**The Empresses Trickery***

Yuffie looked out the large, opened windows staring watching the Sakura trees began to bud. She was bored out of her mind has she sat in the throne, turned sideways, in her royal attire. Not even a hair was out of place as she loosely listened to her council speaking on her new royal guard and concubine. Oh yes, she was ready for that. She knew the reason she was doing this for was selfish and mean spirited, but he reminded her so much of who her she wanted, only he was his living negative.

She'd lost her heart to a man 46 years older than her. He didn't look it and wasn't that physically, but he just couldn't get past the age difference between them. She'd accepted that like a bitter pill but remained friends nonetheless. This had given her an opportunity to have that one selfish want. She knew that they were father and son, but she couldn't leave it alone. Sephiroth was the perfect stand in and in her own denied love. She meant to make things. . .permanent.

As the conversation wrapped up, she turned to them as they finished with what was to be expected.

She'd grown up to be a fine woman in her own way. She was no Tifa Lockhart but she had her own charm. She was still short, coming in at around 5'3. She still was smaller breasted, around firm B cup, her hips flaring at the right places. She had to admit that Sephiroth was beautiful. His angular facial features on snow white skin, jade green eyes with unusual pupils, and impossibly long silvery hair to his shins, and height around 6'3 and strong, muscled frame was drool worthy.

Oh yes, this was going to work splendidly. She only needed to evoke one thing and he was hers for the taking like the great thief she'd been for herself and her country.

An Introduction ceremony was done as the last aspect of this charade Sephiroth secretly thought it was as he sat amongst the other concubine, male and female alike, while dignitaries from all over came. Sephiroth was about to summon Masamune and call it an evening as his forehead vein twitched. He had had his eyes closed willing his strong control into place. He lifted his eyes just as the Empress came into the room and locked eye contact with her. He'd remembered her as a gangly teenager, spouting annoyance as the and the other AVALANCHE members had denounced his reign. They all fought him to the end. She was…pleasing to the eye. She had grown her hair down past her shoulders and developed into a beautiful creature. Time would only tell if her grating voice and childish antics remained.

Yuffie saw Sephiroth across the room, everything seemingly muted around her and a sea of watercolor as her sight was only for him then. She saw the appraising look he gave and the subsequent smirk of approval. Only a true up close and personal greeting would tell if he was still a pompous, arrogant twat he'd been for this illusion to work.

Things went along with each official concubine meeting their respective dignitaries and they began to pair off. Sephiroth was indeed bitter still at this lot in life. He'd known that he made an ass of himself. Well, that was a mild way to put it. He murdered in cold blood and tried to kill the Planet becoming a God, yes that was a more accurate depiction.

He allowed for Yuffie to take him to her innermost chamber and sat on one of the divans. She spoke to him for the first time, her words flooring him.

"Strip. I want to see what I got to work with" she said with a wolfish grin, Sephiroth's temper rising.

"Cannot wait to revert to the _child you are, ne_? Sorry there will be no stripping. "he said confidently.

"Oh it's ok you had a lapse in judgment" she chastised him for denying a direct order but sat him straight. "I am the supreme ruler in Wutai, as such you belong to me. My word, order, and action are your laws, understood? Your body is mine to do with as I feel." Her seriousness turned back annoying just like that. "Let's get along and be the best fuck buddies ever!" she chirped.

Sephiroth stared at her like she'd grown two heads, arms crossed again across his wide expansion of chest. When she showed no signs of backing down on the issues and wore an expectant look on her face after a long pregnant pause, he growled and began almost tearing the clothing from him, leaving him a glaring, _body flushing_ fool. He moved and loomed over her as she sat to try to intimidate her to which she yawned in his face at his antics, feign boredom though he knew her eyes were everywhere on his person. She was familiar with this tactic. Vince used to do it all the time…

He glared until that realization surfaced that she unabashedly ogled his body and his face morphed into a smirk quickly, now leaving her to be flustered.

"Alright clothes back on, we have one more ceremony to do" she tried to look away as if she wasn't affected.

Sephiroth simply put the hakama pants back on, and nothing else.

She wanted to curse like Cid. She was losing the upper hand. No matter, she'd get him. Yuffie had read past Wutaian customs for marriage. While he would remain thinking himself a concubine, she had the power to keep him. She was not keen on losing her virginity randomly to him and he be able to walk away later. Plus, that would be ruining the ruse.

That being said, she had a bottle of her finest, freshly warmed sake.

Sephiroth did not drink because it was wasted on his high metabolism. He looked at it cautiously. Yuffie took in his expression.

"Come now it just to celebrate our bonding" she said airy.

"But there is nothing to celebrate. I am miserable and you are an infant in every way to me "he said haughty exasperation to her.

Yuffie was miffed but she was on a mission so she smiled through his ass hole syndrome. She turned on the charm and appealed to his feeling of being wronged.

"Please Seph, do it for me. Do I literally have to order you to do this? I don't like it any more than you but the council spoke. You know our customs. I am merely a figure head a lot of the time" she said touching him familiarly along his chest. He would drink to have her roaming hands stop that. Besides, his name was Sephiroth-not "Seph".

"Fine. As long as you stop molesting my person", afraid and confused of the tingles her fingers left on his chest. He downed the sake in one go, Yuffie oddly enough doing the same and at the same pace. Something about this seemed familiar, like he'd saw it beforehand. Before he could think on it, he was collapsing due to high sensitivity to alcohol; the Mako made him have no tolerance. Yuffie reached for him and braced him against her chest, unaware of the downright sinister smile on her face over his shoulder. The deed was done.

 _Fallout_

It had been three weeks.

Sephiroth still hadn't broached the subject of sexuality.

She thought all men were horn dogs, Gawd! She had not been thinking about it at the time but Sephiroth was now _Emperor_ Sephiroth by…marriage. Yes, that sake consumption had been an older tradition of Wutai when there was no one to marry a couple, like in times of war. It was a simple way to get Sephiroth and he had fallen for it literally, ending up on the floor crumpled and extremely _drunk_ from one glass due to the sensitivity. If they found out that she was married to Sephiroth, the people could riot, not to mention the neglected Emperor tasks while waiting for the White Rose of Wutai to become the _Red Rose_ of Wutai, as her mother had worn while married to her father, to blatantly Sephiroth leaving with a divorce. She had been _so_ selfish. The ends met the means though she felt. Hell, she was giving him grade A virginity of royalty, which was more than his emotionally retarded self even deserved. Even as she ranted in her mind, even that aspect of being emotionally constipated and socially awkward to the point of being unacceptable remind her of who she had really wanted. Gawd, he was so much like him, but at the end of the day not him.

Sephiroth simply stared at her impassively, gracious for her silence again as her voice made his very ears ring. This would never work out and he knew it but he was yet again an indentured slave, just to another dynasty, the same one where he had done war years beforehand. Though he didn't show it, he felt as if his heart would break again from what all he had had to endure. Aerith had said things would be different this time around. She neglected to say he would be a whore by a different name. It didn't matter, it was all more than he had deserved he gathered from what he'd done beforehand.

Sephiroth hadn't been aware of when Yuffie stopped her inner musings and started to really paying attention to him.

What caught Yuffie's attention was the raw emotion in those unusual eyes. There was hurt and pain actually showing in his eyes. While his exterior was forever aloof, his eyes were showing his feelings on his sleeve. Yuffie was far from not being aware, she wouldn't be a ninja at heart if she wasn't. She could see it: Sephiroth was defeated. He looked like a grand beast…caged.

Yuffie began to regret her move of inadvertently trapping the man.

Sephiroth's life was literally in the history books and he could never live it down. Now, she had trapped him in an obvious position that made him feel degraded.

Sephiroth finally, surprisingly recognized her observing him. Those expressive eyes seemed to frost over when he realized she had saw more than he intended to show. He frowned at her not with his true all and simply turned away from her trying to preserve what was left of his masculinity.

Yuffie felt officially like she was Shinra Corporation all over again. That fact was sobering. If Sephiroth couldn't even be sarcastic and haughty, he felt used and broken. Yuffie shuddered with the revulsion of the epiphany. Would Vincent had felt this way had he been in Sephiroth's shoes?

Sephiroth had gotten up and walked to the exit of the room that led to a lush Sakura blossom tree-filled area. He at least prayed he would be free to go as he pleased around the castle as everything else, including his body was again not his own. He'd moved into the forested area, the moonlight streaming down on his beautiful hair and upturned face and again he fell back into himself in thought.

Yuffie looked at him from afar and all at once knew she had gone too far. She should have left well enough alone but she couldn't quit the emotional turmoil from her teenaged days. The fact of the matter though was that Sephiroth was not Vincent. She had resolved to make the situation work out and try to get to know the enigmatic man.

Sephiroth heard her soft steps approaching him and he balled his fist tightly and clenched his teeth in hopeless irritation. Was she so brazen to ask this of him right now, when he felt his lowest? Why the hell was he even back if he was just to repeat what he'd finally left behind in the Lifestream?

Yuffie knew he could hear her coming by the way his overall body tensed. She tentatively reached out a hand and touched his shoulder blade, coincidently grazing where his wing would manifest.

He had a small body shiver and Yuffie thought to snatch her hand back at first thinking the shiver one of preparing to bound away from her…or fight like a cornered animal. Her words were what kept him from doing just that.

"Hey, look I am…I'm sorry things have turned out this way for you. Clearly you are not happy and I just…no matter what has been or happened, no one should feel like they are trapped" she stated calmly to him as she moved up towards his back, moving her hand to grab one of his own, pressing her body along his back.

There was a tentative silence for a time.

Sephiroth was for the most part shocked he had allowed her to touch him, rules or no rules, especially how he felt at this time. Bowing his head and closing his eyes, he reigned all those emotions again to heel and spoke.

"And yet you have ensnared me. You nor anyone wants to be a part of me so why the façade?" Sephiroth asked her wearily. She answered with a partial truth.

"It was no secret that you were a wonderful swordsman and highly skilled in the arts of Materia. Even when were enemies due to outside involvement, I could admit to that. What is safer than being in your once enemy's arms in this instance? I know how you fight, I know you were and can remain loyal, why would I not want to incorporate you into my dynasty? Besides, you are a looker and that is no secret either. If…If I had to do this with someone, well then you are as good as it gets" she said leaving off the _as good as I can get close to who I wanted._

"It wouldn't be love or any other warm arrangements on my end. I was not made to do this but you are correct in your assumption of my character. I will protect you, I will see to your needs as commanded, and I _will_ fulfill my duties as…your _concubine_ " Sephiroth stated firmly and tiredly.

"Well, that is good to know. I tell you what, I am not game for just jumping right into something of this level. I am a young woman but I am not naïve in anyway. Let's get to know each other since we have no idea how long this arrangement will last" Yuffie stated, knowing exactly how long this would last. It would either be "till death do us part" or a dissolution of the marriage.

Sephiroth seemed to relax at the implication of "taking the slow route". A lot of his stressors were because he had never so much as held a relationship beforehand. There was no time and definitely no normality. He was very much…untouched.

He meant what he said. He would uphold his agreement, until she remarried and he was free.

 _Budding Love_

Over the coming weeks that quickly turned to three full months, that is exactly what they did was get to know each other. She learned that while he was haughty and arrogant, he had had a wicked dry humor and could indeed smile. She had also learned that he suffered from night terrors from time to time as well and a form of depression when the past would catch up with him. She would come to his room and simply sat nearby until he calmed again.

She got to see his skills as several factions popped up as just as quickly were laid to waste by his Odachi, Masamune. He was almost like a dancer while performing his moves and it was apparent he needed not his wing for dizzying heights or Materia as he could cast from himself.

With Yuffie, Sephiroth found that she was very intelligent though she'd played for years that she was just the silly little girl of the group. She had a magnificent business sense, one that was quickly raising Wutai back to its glory before Shinra. He found she was so much more than just a gangly teenager but instead a grown woman, a beautiful woman that had street smarts to go with the book knowledge. It made sense since she would have had to suffer somewhat being depraved of her mother and left to the devices of her father, Godo. He ascertained she suffered from low self-esteem though she tried to talk to make up for it. He realized her nervous talking when she wasn't sure of herself or felt an idiot in one decision or another. He found her Materia categorizing impeccable and amusing, recalling how she had unmanned Cloud and his whole group of their Materia. She clearly had a thing for cats, as they ran to and fro as they pleased.

Above all that they had both learned they also saw other aspects, more intimate aspects in each other as well as the time passed. He enjoyed fighting with her verbally and physically, though he held back never meaning to hurt her truly though some of her blows pushed him back. She was a strong woman honestly.

Yuffie enjoyed, even reveled in seeing Sephiroth training and he would typically do it only in his hakama pants and bare footed as there was a large and roomy Dojo for him to do so. She could see every ripple, every shiver, and every tense muscle in his smooth, pale back as he moved sometimes at normally pace, other times her eyes couldn't keep up with him. She would notice his facial features more when talking, those odd eyes still giving more emotion than she believed he knew was there. He began to completely relax around her, apparent when she would sneak glances at him and he'd just raise a snowy eyebrow in question or smirk at her in response. He had even allowed her to touch his body more than she thought he was aware of. She was always grabbing for his hand or hugging him out of nowhere, him going stiff as a board in her grasp but allowed it. Other times he would relax and pat her hair then quickly come back to himself and dislodge her from him.

The same was with Sephiroth's observation of Yuffie though as time seemed to continuously march on. She had kept her word and didn't force him into any sexual situations, yet his thoughts had begun to stray when in her presence to those aspects. Though she had not forced him to do anything to her, he began to wonder how it would be. He was posted in her room as she changed. Though she did have modesty enough to not go and out do in front of him blatantly, she would change behind a silk room separator that was by the entrance to the garden.

If the light hit just so and with his advanced eyesight, it was like she stood directly in front of him nude. He could see the swell of her bust tight to her body but still generous for her frame. She had a tapered waist that was flat and slight flare of her hips that turned into legs that went the distance though she was of a shorter height. Many of times he had had to turn away for the odd feelings he was having after seeing her, thinking it was just her proximity of her around him.

It was so much more than that. His night terrors that had haunted him slowly were replaced with a different type of shame based horror: sexual conquest. He was beside himself on what was bringing this on.

He knew he was within his right, and she definitely did, but he didn't love her or so he said. Every time she'd pranked him in full grand attire, he knew she was the same old Yuffie from beforehand. His eyes just kept focusing on her face and lovely mouth that liked to cuss like that other "air pirate" person, Cid.

Yuffie was in the exact same boat so to speak. Sephiroth looked like Leviathan in human personification and she wanted to get wet with his holy water. Yuffie was never know to not be crude in her mind. The more she thought about how Sephiroth was just a replacement for Vincent, the more her mind would bombard her with thoughts…of Sephiroth. His looks, his smile, his laughter at her expense. It was then she realized that she really _wanted_ just Sephiroth. She knew what she had done and why she'd done it, but it just seemed so not important looking at the real picture.

She was in love (lust, and everything else) with stupid face Sephiroth.

Now that she had realized it, she simply had to crack him and somehow get him to understand that while her intentions initially were not pure, it was his dumb self she wanted. She schemed until she had the perfect plan.

Sephiroth was becoming more aggressive with his…irritatingly aroused behavior.

He'd said he needed no one, that it led only to more hassles that were unwanted. Why would his body not heed? He growled as her heard her approaching in her normal annoyingly loud and bubbly attitude. All it did cause his hakama problems. Thank goodness they were loose. Anytime she spoke he wanted to shove things into her small warm orifice to shut her up with his pleasure. Yuffie approached noticing those wild eyes landed on what she'd decided to wear in his presence.

Even layered, everything was _sheer_.

He wanted to truly be incensed by the display but he picked up she was playing a game, a game that was very dangerous to her virtue and clothing choice. It was a game for keeps as well since it was the last line to be crossed by either one.

Yuffie began getting nervous about her decision and fell back on picking at Sephiroth to laugh off her failed attempt and embarrassment. If only she knew what she was doing to him she would know it was totally the opposite.

Sephiroth had had enough!

Everything screamed to take her, mark her pale flesh, and to take and take until she couldn't so much as move. He was just about to back away until he heard her verbally back peddling because she thought _he_ wasn't interested. He would show her.

Just as Yuffie was winding down, Sephiroth began gaining on her, closing the distance one large in step at a time.

Yuffie finally really looked up into Sephiroth's eyes. Oh GAWD, she had won him but he looked crazed with the lust.

Sephiroth grabbed her by the arms firmly but not bruising, staring until he met her lips with a demanding and softly moving kiss. It was like the fireworks were ignited. He began pulling down layer after layer of her attire, shredded the silks with bare hands. Yuffie wanted to protest but she was busy at the moment being _consumed_.

It was like that useless concubine training made _a lot of sense._ Before Yuffie knew it, she was on her back, nude before him and he before her on a pile of their shredded clothes.

She wanted to be mad, say that she was the one to call the shots, and that she was the one that would solicit his advances. She realized that she had no sway over Sephiroth.

He was everywhere on her body, memorizing and mapping, hunting and seeking all those little maddening areas on the expanse of her skin she never thought she would ever feel so amazing, especially for whom was doing them.

Honestly, she could not expect anything different from his brilliant and quick mind that had superior strategic skills. He had been a General for a reason. Yuffie moaned at the thought and sighed.

He laid his bare body against her petit frame, careful to not place his actual weight on her by having his arms rest alongside her head, weight supported by his bent elbows.

He was diligent. There was one hand massaging her right breast and he was breathing that deliciously warm air in her ear and licking along the shell and then nipping it with his perfect teeth.

Yuffie gasped at his body heat and the little motions he was doing to her. She felt like the was burning alive from the inside-and she wanted to be consumed by the inferno building in her.

He had moved down her body and had switched hands and breast, and was now worrying the nipple with his that his hand had just abandoned. Yuffie squeaked out in shock and the intense feeling of him nursing her as if he was a child at her teat. Soon he was back directly on her, hands rubbing from her neck to her shoulders to the very tips of her fingers and back again. He adjusted and was slightly on his knees to give him more range of motion as he kissed, nipped, and licked his way down her body, all the while his hands caressed her sides and her hips. Without permeable, he pulled her to himself and locked her into place. From this angle and distance Yuffie could still feel his body heat radiating and also something insistently pressing into her left thigh.

Yuffie gulped. She could feel the _entire_ length of him branding her inner thigh, resolute to breech her body. She for once admitted that she was afraid since she was a virgin and he, he was very endowed.

Before his nerves could cause him to falter, Sephiroth moved lower towards her sacred entry. He'd said in the beginning that he would never practice this, but Yuffie smelled _divine._ She went to say something, anything to side attract him and instead a cry of amorous shock erupted from her mouth.

Sephiroth had leveled his face with her femininity. After taking a careful _bare_ finger to trace the lips of her rose, her slowly dipped that same finger, then another, into her and began to gently pump it inside. He could make out her what she said to him earlier: her hymen was still intact. He felt slightly relieved that he wasn't alone in this way and confident, though he knew he had a good ten years on her in age to be a virgin.

She writhed on the two finger alone; she was so tight. He then removed the finger from her body and just as Yuffie was about to become miffed that her pleasure ceased, something warm and wet lapped at her folds.

Yuffie's mind blanked.

Sephiroth, her ex-enemy, was performing cunnilingus on her! She groaned at the feeling, trying to clench her legs around his head while skewering his lovely long locks of silvery hair with her dainty fingers as she bent towards his questing mouth.

Sephiroth was with the Goddess Minerva this was so wonderful.

Yuffie was shaking badly like a leaf at his ministrations and was trying to curl into herself at the pleasure. He groaned deeply against her at her pulling his hair tightly.

With that groan, him worrying her clitoris, and then the vibration of his admitted sound sounding so…erotic reaching to her toes, it made the tension in her stomach release, and she flooded Sephiroth's mouth as she came with a wail.

Sephiroth sat up, mouth glistening from her and looked at her as he cleaned himself like some great cat who'd enjoyed its feast.

Yuffie's eyes were glazed over but she could see the pleased triumph in his. Oh she wanted to be pissed, she really did. He was being cocky, no pun intended, even now. Her body had other ideas though. Sephiroth moved to place his tool at her entry while he spoke in a dark, sinful tone.

"You've driven me insane with this want, you have no one to blame for this action. You've enticed this action from me with no care. I want to loath you for your interference but there is a higher force at play. I concede completely Yuffie Kisaragi, White Rose of Wutai."

Yuffie was squirming to get him closer in position. She wanted him to shut up and fuck her.

"I will be your concubine through and through" he said with a purr. "It will hurt, I am sorry ahead of time for that is something I cannot lessen for you" Sephiroth ended his statement, Yuffie thinking it was lost cause until his words and his turgid flesh surged into her.

Her eyes blew wide with her back bowed and she _screamed._ Sephiroth surged forward to swallow the rest of that sounds she made with a sealing kiss for his double pleasure.

Sephiroth's sensitive hearing would not have that level of _sound_ and he slit his eyes and clenched his teeth at both stimuli now: Yuffie clenching him tightly internally and the ringing in his ears. He'd allowed them both time to adjust and began a slow but deep thrust into the newly deflowered Empress. She was so outstandingly hot, impossibly tight, and perfect inside.

He felt his member and sanity would melt away with the process.

Yuffie was in anguish. It hurt worse than she'd thought maybe his Masamune would actually feel buried in her gut, but he'd paused for her to get her bearings. She grasped at his pectorals with her small hands spasmodically. Her touch was also surprisingly wanted, he even cherished it on his too hot skin.

He began moving in her and a frisson of pleasure went through her at each pump in her pliant body. She found she wanted more, to have him crack fully from the feelings that only her body gave him. Once she was lost to the feeling, she climbed into his lap. She felt herself take more of him in, stretching and reaching impossibly deep. The movement made him see colorful burst behind his eyes. He was fully encompassed in her body.

He growled low in his chest and began a punishing pace. Yuffie screamed again and instinctively melded his mouth sloppily with hers, as they continued gyrating, skin on skin, and sharing their all with each other. For the life of Sephiroth he couldn't care about his hearing. He lifted her up and down on his flesh and then the most peculiar sensation of her internally tightening to near painful happened and her head landed on his shoulder with a thump, tears shook loose from pooling in her eyes, moistening the skin there, then she was wailing for all it was worth-directly into his ear.

Goddess it hurt! All he could hear was a white noise from her cry like someone had shot a gun at close range or a grenade had exploded nearby.

He had an answer for that. He quickly flipped her over to her stomach and gagged her with a few strips of their silken mess that used to be clothing. She attempted to fight the action and in one movement, he was back inside her. She threw her head back squealed for all that was Leviathan's glory. This new position touched _everything_ inside her frame.

Sephiroth was furiously pounding into her as he draped himself along with his silvery hair, along her body, like a shade to protect her. Every so often her vaginal walls would contract again with that same intensity and she would wail like a banshee, scrabbling at the moss and silk below her. She was very muffled which his ears thanked him for. He didn't understand what she was doing to him, or him fully to her until it hit him from "training".

"You're… in an orgasmic state constantly…" he more or less said to no one breathy with a hint of amusement in his voice, though it was raspy from him been turned on so. as he continued to assault her body fully as realization hit. Had she'd been able to see, she'd see his pleased, cruel smile on his face as euphoria flowed freely between them.

The thought that he was _conquering her so wholly_ drove him wild with passion. He rammed into her ceaselessly, feeling a tightening in his groin. At first he was afraid of it, fighting it until he realized that he was coming upon his own end. He continued through five more internal orgasms from Yuffie, she at this time gurgling nonsensical Wutaian at this point and moaning, and with his euphoric face upturned, all at once he stiffened head to toe, as he'd held her up with one steel band of an arm and braced himself with the other along her side, as the tsunami of emotions and raw feeling hit him fully, him crying out Yuffie's name brokenly and he filled her to the brim. He knew that he'd be mortified and irritated later about his own behavior, now he didn't care. He fell to the side of her, borderline hyperventilating but feeling so exquisite.

Why had he'd waited this whole time?

He had the good mind to ungag Yuffie as she slipped insensibly down onto the crushed soft grass and silken material feeling cool to their heated skin.

Sephiroth had a flash of worry that he had hurt her. He hadn't been in check of his emotions, or strength. She was … _gaping_ as wonderfully as any wound that Masamune could have done, only the fluid was not crimson red of life that fully came from her. His own had intermingled.

It would not do to murder the Empress by having done your duty. Just as he was going to tend to her after slightly recovering, she slightly squirmed with her eyes still closed in sleep after losing consciousness. What she said in her twilight is what got Sephiroth to completely focus on her and her words.

"…was the best. Ugh, gonna walk like I was horseback riding for a week. Marrying him was the best decision *yawn* ever…" and with a petite snore, Yuffie was back under in the dream scape.

Sephiroth sat up rigidly, glowing eyes pinned on the unsuspecting woman. It all hit him as old memories tended to do, and quickly.

That's where he'd saw the exchanging of Sake. His men that defected from the War with the local women. They had hastily "married" with the _exchanging of glasses Sake_ since there was no time for a marriage officially-not on a battlefield. They had been the same ones he'd been ordered to cut their marriages and lives short for their turncoat behavior…he had been just a child himself. He suddenly felt that familiar wave of nausea again.

Sephiroth understood why he'd forgotten about it; it was attached to a terrible memory in his life.

What had she done? Would she really risk an upheaval of her people making him _Emperor?_

She knew his history on her soil. What about the honor of her lost mother at Shinra's hands? Thirdly, why him; What about his thoughts on the matter?

He thought that he was indentured until such a time she was ready to marry and him cast aside so that he may roam far and wide, not…this.

Again Yuffie mumbled in her sleep giving him his answer though surprisingly, the answer hurt him more than he would be willing to admit.

"Stupid Vince...you knew how I felt about you. S'fine, your son fits nicely…in my vagina" she giggled in her sleep and with that she turned over unaware of all of her secrets she'd kept revealed.

He knew exactly who "Vince" was. He knew who his real parents were. One was to be encased in Mako the rest of her days and the other cursed to walk the lonely road of immortality, looking the age he was when Sephiroth was born...

After all, his father had tried to get him to see reason and had went up against him in his path to insanity that was false Godhood. When it was all done, and he laid there dying, Vincent while crying himself had told him all he could as his eyes and life were eclipse and he held him until he'd died. He'd remember that no matter how many time he was revived. The man had meant no malice, none of them really did. He'd been so mentally broken…

Sephiroth felt the fool. He had no idea just how used he'd been by this tiny woman. He didn't care if there were consequences, he was leaving tomorrow from this life, from this land, and away from Yuffie Kisaragi's side.

He picked her up and headed back into the main chamber, closing the doors to the garden leaving the depraved sight that had been their lovemaking behind. Despite it all, he couldn't be as cruel as he wanted to be to her. He wanted to shake her, yell at her for using him, and for…taking his heart and one part of him he'd held for so long and extinguishing his faith that she'd accepted him for him, something that had never been done.

He tucked her in her bed after washing her down of the evidence of what they'd done. Soon after his own shower, he went slept in his own private chamber though sleep didn't come.

The next morning, he rose before the sun and stole away to the old seamstress's house. She opened up the door and ushered him in. Sephiroth had come for his armor as he meant to leave as he'd came.

Miyuki looked at Sephiroth as if she had a recognition of someone else. She quickly told him that his armor was not ready but that if he'd allowed her an hour, she would have it done. Sephiroth reluctantly agreed since wanted to be gone as fast as possible and hopefully before the first signs of dawn.

Instead of her normal scowling at him, she decided to tell him about her son that had been a TURK for Shinra and disappeared some years back. Sephiroth, though preoccupied, thought it odd but listen beginning to end.

With his armor repaired and armed with more knowledge, he gave one last genuine smile to the older lady and thanks and summoned his ether wing, began flying away towards his father in Edge.

Miyuki watched after him as black feathers fell like snow in his wake and simply said "It's not sayonara, only see you at a later time "she said with a smile as she walked back into her house. She went and to look a picture on her working desk that her son had sent while he was in the service of himself and a woman that looked remarkably like Sephiroth…

He needed to sort his feelings and his father's feelings for Yuffie. He would not be used, not in that intimate way.

After resting on and off, Sephiroth made it to Edge.

Many of the people recognized him and gave a wide berth for him to pass. With one unlucky fellow, Sephiroth cuffed him asking where Seventh Heaven was. The man squeaked out the answer and Sephiroth promptly put him down, moving along his way again.

Finally finding his destination, Sephiroth entered the establishment.

Just as Tifa was about to greet the new patron, the words froze in her throat at looking upon Sephiroth.

"What are you doing here?" Tifa asked slowly, fearing something might have befallen Yuffie if he was here.

Sephiroth sensed her hostility by her confusion of him being there and spoke.

"Do not worry, the Empress is fine and in Wutai. I have come for my father; do you know his whereabouts?" he asked with more confidence than he felt. He felt exposed, like him being used was an open, festering wound everyone could see.

"Why have you come Sephiroth? The deep, gravelly voice of one Vincent Valentine asked, suddenly to his side.

"May we…speak in private?" Sephiroth asked in a low voice glancing to the side to Tifa, not in the least shocked at the man's appearance suddenly.

Vincent looked at the boy. He looked…wrong and haggard. He looked back at Tifa asking with his eyes to hold off on calling the WRO.

Tifa relented and allowed for Vincent to handle the situation, especially since Sephiroth had come of his own accord and called him "father".

Once they had made it up the stairs to what he now knew to be Vincent's old room, Sephiroth stepped into the room, Vincent behind him and the door was closed soundly.

"What has occurred that you would _fly_ all the way here to seek me and break your oath?" Vincent asked posted against the closed door, arms crossed his chest and eyes searching for only truth.

Sephiroth swung around, wanting to be upset at the man that would be so cool towards him, but even as he tried to hold his face in a menacing glare, it just fell apart and Sephiroth found himself sitting on the side of the bed holding his face in his hands.

Vincent quickly went from concerned for Yuffie to concern for Sephiroth at the man's behavior as he stared on for a moment. He registered that Sephiroth was imperceptibly quaking, then he saw it more than he heard it.

Drop after drop of clear liquid leaked from Sephiroth's barred face held with his hands. There was a short, sorrowful moan that turned in to a bitter laugh.

Vincent then moved with the wind to Sephiroth's side. He could be passive to his son's odd behavior no longer as he seemed to be…crying.

"Again I ask you Sephiroth, what has transpired?" as he sat by the man giving him some space but also enough to know he was there by him.

"What does it really matter. I was fooled and I was hurt as I am always in this endless cycle of rebirth. I swore my being to a person that was not even seeing me. I suppose she's not doing anything abnormal as that is what everyone has ever did" Sephiroth rambled, bitterness and pain radiating through the words.

Vincent was beginning to understand what had transpired but had no idea just how far things had progressed. He'd known that Yuffie pined for him but it was not reciprocated. He needed a woman not only in body but mind. Yuffie at the time had been still too immature. Tifa had been the right choice in the end. Not to mention they both had their histories of unrequited love, something that now Sephiroth seemed to be experiencing. Vincent was saddened by this.

On Sephiroth's return, he'd allowed it because he thought that Yuffie may warm to him and they could make a life with each other. Yuffie had changed in her later years and calmed significantly.

Vincent was taken from his musings by Sephiroth speaking.

"Did you know that she loved you? She used me to simply get a memory of you. You all laughed at my ultimate folly. Do you know that I had begun to trust her? I… "Sephiroth said rising from the bed and pacing and unable to finish his thought.

Vincent now genuinely worried and on the alert. Something terrible had happened to him, to them, and he again was to blame for his progeny's new pain.

Sephiroth paced and pulled his hair in irritation, shooting blood shot green eyes glaring at him in hatred and hurt. Vincent felt like he'd punched him.

Then Sephiroth said the thing that settled the guilt firmly inside Vincent's bones.

"I gave my body to her, beyond honor or duty, simply because I had learned to care, even love her. Yes, she was loud, boisterous pain in my ass but she also was a survivor. Do you know what she's done? She has in her need to have you, married me in an old Wutaian custom of war. I am no indentured servant, I am her husband and Emperor of Wutai! Goddess, what am I to do? "Sephiroth said shaking badly with hurt and ashamed of his behavior that he couldn't stop.

Vincent looked stricken from this news.

Sephiroth stood and cried for all the injustice done to him, this last one being a heavy blow. He spoke softly once more as he calmed himself.

"By the way, you should go home sometimes, father _._ I am sure grandmother would love to see you".

Vincent's eyes widen in shock. Surely he jests of meeting his mother in Wutai. She would be in her 80's now. Before he could ask him or even comfort him to the best of his ability, Sephiroth was slipping out the window and away on the wind.

Vincent called to him but the man was gone. He made it back down to the bar where Tifa's questioning eyes were. He quickly filled her in on what had transpired and the consequences of Yuffie's rash behavior.

Sephiroth was gone and emotionally hurt and Yuffie was now alone and very much exposed now with Sephiroth not by her side.

All they could do is fly to Wutai and see if this was all true. They knew Sephiroth could hide anywhere he wanted to and not be found.

***Back in Wutai***

Yuffie had woken from the greatest dream of her life. Sephiroth had taken her several ways. There were visible signs of sexual conquest along her body in finger pattern bruising and the telltale signs of the dull ache of her center. She was disappointed that he had not shared her bed and rose to wrap a gown around herself, making to go look for him when her PHS rang.

At the end of that call, she knew that her friends were coming and that her would be husband would not be found as he'd left early that morning before she even roused. She began to cry, angry and hurt that he'd taken something so precious from her and not felt a thing. As she bemoaned her lot in life, a memory born of a dream came to her. She had remembered talking about Vincent's loss of having her and Sephiroth being the "perfect replacement" though she hadn't meant it that way.

She loved Sephiroth for himself. The more the thought swirled in her head, the more she worried. What if she'd said that…in her sleep in his hearing range? He didn't know how she felt truly as she never said. But what if he had mistaken the wonderful gift that she knew she'd gotten from him as him being generic warm body from her words? She'd know that they were both virgins, him because of warring and being used, her because she had never found the right one, until now. She began to cry in earnest. She was so saddened she had not told him and if she was right about her "sleep talking", even she herself would be miles away from her own self. She'd have to wait till tomorrow when her friends arrived.

 _Love tested and Honor bound_

It had been two months since Sephiroth had left Yuffie Kisaragi's side and he slipped from Vincent's window.

Her friends had come as they said and Vincent had confirmed her worst nightmare: Sephiroth had heard her in her sleep and had taken it badly. They had not found him as of course as he proved himself resourceful.

She had been numb to the news, truly worrying Tifa who was with Vincent. Any other time her being there would have bothered her, the "why her over me?" question would have circulated in her mind over and over if not vocally.

Yuffie found instead that she was genuinely happy for them. They had like histories of denied love so they would understand each other. Yuffie found that she missed Sephiroth's cocky face, the deep timbre of voice, and angelic features not because of whose son he was, but that she loved him and his personality.

He was also to be a father and he didn't even know. She had been sick and vomiting like when air traveling actually putting two and two together quickly when no monthly cycle showed up in 4 weeks. She'd had no choice but to approach the council and speak of her treacherous behavior, marrying Sephiroth in secret.

They of course had been output by the revelation, and of her coming child. The only thing that they agreed on was that at least it was Wutaian and not a bastard in the dynasty. Though they had said that they would have welcomed their children from their union, they most likely would have been stripped of all royal ties and sent away because of who Sephiroth was and what he represented to their country. Now she knew exactly how he'd felt on revival again. The world would never let him live in peace.

Yuffie was depressed. She didn't eat well, sleep well, or otherwise, though Tifa and Vincent had decided to stay with her through her pregnancy for support.

Vincent did seek out his mother and found her easily. She didn't flinch or even shy away from his unchanging features, pallid skin tone, or menacing metal claw.

In fact, the small woman hugged him tightly and welcomed him into her home with his own wife Tifa. They had spoken of all that had occurred in Vincent's life since that photo and of Sephiroth's conception, abuse by Vincent's inability or inactivity to act and help, and of course his very public, very known downfall.

Of course she had known that Vincent was alive, just not how remained the same as the photo of him and that young lady, Lucrecia, Sephiroth's mother. After their reunion, Vincent and Tifa opted to stay with her and visit daily to the Yuffie's Wutai Castle.

The weeks past fast, now five months since Sephiroth had laid with Yuffie. Yuffie looked tired and numb, nothing at all of herself before and both friends worried about her. Yuffie lightly teased with Vincent since his birthday was in a few days. Though she did, it was not the same, she suffered from a broken heart and it was just as wrong on Yuffie as it had been on Sephiroth.

She decided to go public with the news. She had a conference live from her castle, flanked by her counsel and two friends. She told the world that she was now the Red Rose of Wutai and that she was expecting.

There were cheers below her verandah at the news. Those quickly turned to screams of death and betrayal as she said _who_ she'd married. She endured the rants, the insulting jabs at her and her unborn child, and also the claim that she was a whore and a traitor.

She stood firm through it all. When it was done she quickly turned on her heel and fled the backlash from her people and held to her love for Sephiroth regardless. She crumpled to her bed and cried for all that had occurred wishing she could make it right as Tifa helped her to bed and caressed her hair in a very motherly way to calm her until she fell asleep.

Sephiroth had never cared for technology as a whole as it was too close to…science taking precedent, and that meant it was close to… _Hojo_.

He'd never been big on even television. He'd found a desolate cabin on the Nibelhiem mountain path. Something told him to turn on the dilapidated television and he didn't think he'd touched it in all these months. Surprisingly it worked and with perfect clarity. What he saw though on the television floored him.

He couldn't believe his eyes. There, on the screen was Yuffie Kisaragi, with her counsel and what seemed to be Tifa and Vincent dressed accordingly for Wutai, as she gave her speech before her people. He listened from beginning to end in rapt attention. Sephiroth watched the emotions change like a strong and dangerous tide as she publicly announced him as her husband and... father of her unborn child.

Sephiroth's mind reeled with so many emotions. He was pleased to see her, even more of a child he'd not known about but bitter by her words all over again, and now completely disarmed by this information.

She was pregnant with his legal heir?

Sephiroth watched her weather the comments, her face determined but haggard. She said that she wished that he would hurry in his "travels", masking that he had left her to her devices.

Sephiroth felt conflicted. Had not what they'd been, been just a means to an end? She wanted Vincent, his father, and there stood Tifa, holding his father's _ringed_ hand. He looked to Tifa's hand. There sat a beautiful wedding ring on her finger as well.

Sephiroth had been rash. He had let words from a dream startle him away instead of allowing her to explain herself. People couldn't be held responsible by dreams; he knew that firsthand. The nightmares he endured from his past would continue on for the rest of his days.

She was pregnant with his child that she obviously wanted and was suffering for her decision to publicly claim him. She had to have felt something to face this amount of backlash, pregnant or not. He rubbed his hands down his face. He would have to return to her and let her speak her mind. He'd let her alone, shirking his responsibilities in cowardice. He'd…missed her.

Much like before, he flew back to Wutai, resting ever so often.

What he arrived to was madness.

Wutai was in upheaval. There were riots and there was family member against family member either for or against her. There were homes aflame and it triggered more horrible memories from the war again of similar scenes unfolding.

He had to find her. Everything she had built was literally being torn down because of her foolish love for him.

He saw a great crowd of protesters becoming increasingly violent. He reached the castle to see Vincent and Tifa physically fighting off the more skilled, fighting protesters.

He ran to find her, he had to find her. His heart had never raced so fast. He ran from room to room still not successful but found that Tifa and Vincent had fought the crowd away.

Sephiroth ran to Yuffie's room- only to see her fighting with her shuriken. She was now five months and she fought and had disabled those in her room.

When Sephiroth laid eyes on her, even with hair askew and kimono loose, she was the most beautiful thing he'd ever saw. He ran to her as Tifa and Vincent hung back, hearing the helicopters from the WRO landing in the distance to release the TURKS and other fighters to break up the violence outside.

Yuffie's wild brown eyes focused on Sephiroth and she began to cry anew, happy to see her message had reached him, that he had come. She had done it all for him to come back to her. She stood by the entry to the doors of her garden where their child was made and Sephiroth despite not having all the answers from her, felt compelled to hold her.

As Sephiroth and Yuffie embraced, she jerked violently, the smile on her face turning into confusion as she absently fingered the now end of a sword piercing her flesh.

Tifa and Vincent sprang into action. Several of her own guards lurked in waiting to hurt him the worst way: by killing Yuffie and her unborn child in front of him.

Sephiroth allowed for Tifa and Vincent to take her from him numbly, as a sword buried in her side was pulled from her body as she had lost consciousness and was bleeding copiously.

He watched everything as if in slow motion, looking impassively as his rage built quickly and pure. His face was stony and his eye glowed with an unholy green light. Vincent and Tifa healed her over and over again with high level restore to stop the bleeding and stabilize her. They didn't know the status of his precious child. . .

The very air warped with Sephiroth's unleashed anger and power, it becoming a suffocating force for all but Tifa and Vincent, knowing what he could and was going to do for those foolish enough to damage what was his.

Sephiroth was an inherently selfish person of his things…of his love. With his hand raised he summoned Masamune and called upon fire in his other hand as he stonily watched the guards try and _fail_ to escape. Not only would the guards suffer a dishonorable death, it would also be quite painful.

Sephiroth had cast manipulate on the lot of them, freezing them in their tracks and went to war.

Tifa and Vincent ignored the men's screaming and pleas. There would be no help for them this time as they had betrayed the Empress and their _Emperor._ Once the men's bodies were in several pieces, he burned the bodies and used a barrier of sorts around it to contain the fire.

Yuffie was stabilized but now seemed to be in distress and Vincent and Tifa's heart dropped knowing that she was in early labor from the wound, concerned the child was to be stillborn. Sephiroth looked back at the scene of his _wife's_ _pain_ just for wanting him and he screamed bloody murder and flew off into the capital in a blind rage.

Even as the TURKS worked to not harm those who were violent in return, Sephiroth mowed them down with no care anymore. He was the Emperor of Wutai and his word and acts law.

With Sephiroth more or less berserk, the rioters and protesters quickly disbanded in no time seeing the alternative to fighting the world's enemy now their leader.

Once it was calm and the fires put out, Sephiroth came back to himself and was rushing back to Yuffie.

Yuffie screamed again as she pushed again, her body already exhausted from being healed from heavy blood loss.

Tifa could see the child crowing, its hair was jet-black. Yuffie pushed again on Tifa and Vincent's urging and finally the child's head was freed. On the last push to free the child, Sephiroth stepped back into the room, Yuffie wailing out her pain.

The child was finally free of Yuffie's body-but did not cry.

Sephiroth woodenly stepped over to Tifa who was crying for her friend and holding the infant that despite being born extremely early, looked close to full term, but was quickly cooling in her very hands.

He reached for the child, hearing Yuffie's crying like a funeral dirge in the back of his consciousness. Holding the motionless child, he did what he never done before, not as a sign of religion or true faith, but as a sign of desperation.

Sephiroth prayed to Aerith. He wanted the child to live.

It wasn't just that the mother live and the innocent child perish due to hate. He prayed feverishly though no one knew, thinking him grieving for his firstborn.

Just as Sephiroth was coming to grips with the idea that the child was to be a new casualty among so many in his long and terrible life, there was movement from the child that he held against his chest. The movement became more insistent and finally a thin wail broke everyone's early mourning.

Looking down at his child in his hands, he pulled the covering back and saw that the little girl, his little girl, was indeed fusing and crying out for attention to her liveliness.

Tifa covered her mouth against her own tears in relief as Yuffie also cried for a different reason.

Sephiroth and her child was alive. Yes, they were not on solid footing yet but seeing Sephiroth come to her when he could have remained elusive meant something. Somehow those around instinctively knew that it was Aerith's will from the Lifestream.

The child had been still, even pale and bluing at first look.

Sephiroth cradled the child to himself again and the babe calmed all together. He had never felt such protection and love for something so small. The humor was not lost on the fact that with Yuffie's hair color and his features which were a solid mixture of his own parents, the child looked like Vincent.

When her eyes opened up, instead of baby blue colored irises, they were Lifestream in color. But it was the center of each eye that was so magnificently beautiful. Around each irregular pupil like her father's own, was a firework burst of crimson red like her now grandfather's eyes. She was perfect in every way despite the way she had to come into the world, and almost not experienced it. He gently leveled his eyes on his daughter and for once in the presence of others, kissed her cheek again and allowed a small smile to come to his face.

 _Epilogue_

Yuffie sat in her bed chamber in a chair nursing her now five-month old daughter Phiri Moira Crescent-Valentine.

Yuffie laughed to herself at the long name the child had been given. She hadn't known Sephiroth's full last name but she also now held the same title. It had tickled her immensely that she could not only pick on Vincent for being the father to her husband but that she _still_ had gotten her way and got his last name. Tifa even had found it hilarious, knowing it was in all good fun.

She had thought on all the aspects that made her daughter's name so interesting. "Phiri" was a play on the actual fury that her father had unleased in holy hell in Wutai when he had thought she was lost to him. Moira was adaptation Vincent's father Grimoire Valentine's first name in his honor, one Sephiroth gladly gave to his grandfather he never knew. The "Crescent" of course was Lucrecia's last name and Valentine, well that came with the son via the father.

Yuffie had reminisced about their conversation after things had went back to somewhat normal. She had told him that she had loved him before they had even consummated their marriage. She had admitted that initially due to her own pain of being rejected by Vincent, she had set out to used him as a fill in. Sephiroth had not been pleased to hear what he'd known but as she continued to go into further detail about what she had begun to love about him specifically, he simply preened as if it was the correct choice and answer. She found she couldn't and wouldn't change his arrogance ever.

He had told her he had grown faster in the womb, as all their children would because of his makeup. She was never more thankful for that aspect of his physiology since Phiri would not have survived, even with Aerith's blessing, she had been too delicately small and underdeveloped. She blushed deeply at the implications of more children or rather _how_ more children would be created.

Miyuki was fortunate to see her granddaughter and her son before she closed her eyes in death, which she stubbornly said that she had a few good years yet to which everyone laughed, even Vincent chuckled and smiled genuinely. After officially meeting the older woman, Yuffie could see why he'd had struggled so with controlling his demons. He had his mother's temper and they were tied together by emotions. His personality came by her naturally as she was a feisty old bat and she had successfully produced it seemed three generations of stubborn knuckle heads, including Phiri who already threw fits at a tender age.

It was doubly hilarious to see Sephiroth _and_ Vincent squirm at the impending birth of Vincent's second child…via Tifa. Sephiroth would be _34 years older_ than his brother or sister, and Vincent would be having his second child…at 61. Tifa, Yuffie, and Miyuki had found that painfully amusing.

The men did not.

Sephiroth had first and foremost been recognized and installed as the new Emperor of Wutai with Yuffie at his side. They had also had a small and intimate wedding for her friends and Sephiroth's remaining colleagues to come to.

Her friends had taken the news like wide mouth basses.

Cid had summed up that if anyone could go from being a concubine to being a ruler, and find love, it sure as hell would be Sephiroth, all the while Barrett also nodded sagely at Cid's musings.

Sephiroth had glared furiously at the man as he smoked in the vicinity of his offspring. Before he could murder Cid, Cloud had headed him off, away from the older man.

Cloud was…agreeable despite Vincent and Tifa being married and now Yuffie and himself as well. He man had gone off and found him someone he could love. Shockingly, his true love was Rufus Shinra and apparently the other had accepted the feelings as well. Explained a lot of things about the boy and about Tifa and Cloud's "puppy love" they had forever. He couldn't even be shocked about the news. Even Cloud had conceded that the emotions he had felt were Aerith were residual from Zachary's memory.

Vincent and Tifa had decided to become fixtures of Wutai as well. Tifa being in the family way, had turned the bar over to her adopted teenage child, Denzel who remained co-parents with Cloud whom he lived with. Elena and Rude helped with the financing and manpower, even though Elena was married to Reno. She knew he'd drink more of the product than sell it. Funny enough they had had another from their history move back as well to Wutai. Apparently Tseng had come home after the full need of the TURKS of old weren't need in the same capacity. They instead had a hybrid of SOLIDER/TURKS that had now been employed by President Shinra, sans the Mako.

Sephiroth had walked into the nursery room where Yuffie had been lost in thought over all that had transpired with Phiri now asleep against her chest. He moved ever so cautiously and lifted the infant into his arms, looking her over. She really did look like him. Only time would tell of her full personality and Sephiroth felt he was in anticipation of being the parent he'd never had. He slowly bent forward to kiss her forehead as she slept, her slightly moving and scowling in her sleep to which he laughed silently.

If anyone had told him he would be willingly back in Wutai, hitched to Yuffie Kisaragi, and now the _Emperor_ no less with a child, he'd probably lit them on fire while looking uninterested. He knew it would have been overreacting but he knew himself. He found that he was comfortable for once in his skin and all was right as he had his father and grandmother, his wife, and his child. Not to mention even though he didn't want it, he also had an Empire.

 _**In the Lifestream**_

"Since he has become at peace with life, your transgressions have been absolved. You are now ready to be free of your shackles metaphysically and are able to move on and be reborn if you wish even" a cheerful voice spoke.

A woman, who bore a striking resemblance to Sephiroth, for once in a long lifetime, cried happy tears for the joy she was experiencing. She would be free to finally move on as the two people in her life had after she had wronged the both but they had found peace and now she could too.

Aerith, the young woman that spoke beforehand, gave her an alternate option.

"While the one you loved has moved on at this time and is truly happy and would not stray, would you like to be with your son and meet your grandchild instead?" the young lady asked.

Looking at Lucrecia Crescent's face, Aerith knew the woman's answer.

A young woman held her hand up against the bright sun and smiled, her long auburn hair swinging down her back as she'd just crossed into the gates of Wutai.

Everything had been built back to its former glory once again after the fallout of Sephiroth's real title was known. He had personally saw to it along with his father Vincent as they built, repaired, and replaced the damage done to the now bustling city.

Sephiroth was now walking with a quickly growing Phiri and talking to his father who held his own infant son in his arms, Tobias Raven Valentine, as they went to head back to the Castle from the market area.

The young lady, Lucrecia, saw the men before they saw her and greeted them accordingly.

"It's been a long time Sephiroth my son, and Vincent my old love. It seems you two have been busy" she giggled leaving the two men speechless.

~+~*~+~*End~+~*~+~


End file.
